Its oh so quiet Shh Shh

[Mommy2many]

Couldn't keep my mouth shut on this one...

The posts before me have tried to instill a sense of "think before you speak", "Empathy and compassion"

Examples:

Best of luck kicking the cigarettes. You are in our prayers.

The response:

If you think that will help and you wish to go ahead and pray, then go for it.

It's not about what we believe or how we display it. It's about the person's compassion and empathy he can have towards you to express that he cares and wants to support you in your struggle, suffering and/or endeavors.

We are here to support each other with information, compassion, empathy, understanding, humor, art and instruction. It's a balance of life, all of these things and should be respected.

One should learn to temper individual feelings and opinions when they are to be expressed publicly, or face the repercussions of our actions. I am not saying to lose yourself to the masses. Identify a discussion where sympathy and understanding are warranted verses a discussion where instruction and truth are necessary.

If one is not finding what they need here, they can always look elsewhere.

[kibakiba]

I have to agree with Le Ann. When a snake dies, something goes wrong or your having a hardship, it's nice to know that you aren't alone and that there's someone at least thinking about you. Why post about it if you don't want some empathy or compassion? People are just showing you that they care about the hard time your going through, and you're acting like they're not worth your time. Be happy that people care for you, and at least show some respect about it.

[ConcinusMan]

Once again, Le Ann, you have lost me and I have no idea what you're talking about. Sorry. Everyone seems to understand but me, and nobody seems to understand where I'm coming from except for the people who hardly ever participate here for the same reasons I don't understand.

Now I'll bet that made no sense to any of you.

I tried to take what you have told me and made my response accordingly. I still managed to piss somebody off. If I try to explain why I responded the way I did, all I'm going to do is dig a deeper hole for myself so forget it.

[PINJOHN]

If you think that will help and you wish to go ahead and pray, then go for it. As for me, I just got back from the phamacy and slappin' a nicotine patch on.

Not a heavy smoker, just hard to break it. Starting with step 2 seems to be enough for me as a starting point. It's not like I haven't been through this before.

Still, beating myself up for going back to it multiple times over the years will do no good. It's a lifelong addiction. They say it's like heroin. If that's true than history tells us through musicians such as Curt Cobain and Layne Staley, you should just try, and try again. No sense in feeling defeated. They gave up in feelings of defeat, and look what happened to them.

Honestly I don't know what's worse. The health issues and expense if I continue to smoke, or the agony of quitting. All I know is that I'm sick and tired of being chained to it and having to exile myself from my own house outside in the cold and rain to have a cigarette. I beat cocaine and I beat meth. It was extremely difficult but neither of those comes even close to this.

I sympathize with you in you efforts to quit smoking, i went through this twenty something years ago, this was before the days of patches and suchlike. i hit on an insight which helped me, of course it still took willpower and determination but once i realized that on the several times that i had tried quitting before i was [subconsciously] waiting for some crisis [large or small] in my life so that i could start again, the realization was like defusing a waiting land mine, it still took some determination but i had removed the excuse to start again. this may be a general thing or perhaps it was personal to me i dont know, but perhaps it might help you ,i hope so

[ConcinusMan]

I've heard that before and every time my parents went back to smoking it was triggered by some stressful event. I have no such excuse. I don't really know why I went back to it.

[guidofatherof5]

Everyday is a victory Richard. My Father died due to his 2+ pack a day of Marlboro's.
Unfortunately, my only childhood memory is his smokers cough at night.
I wish you the best on this difficult but winnable battle.

[ConcinusMan]

Thank you Steve. I had to get some patches after 3 days. I just couldn't take the withdrawals. Still, at least it's not smoke in my lungs and the amount of nicotine I'm getting in the course of a day (14mg) is still much less than I was getting by smoking.(around 22mg) In two weeks I'll step it down to only 7mg per day. I'll do that for 2-3 weeks before I try going without it all together.

Anyway, the discomfort is minimal now. I might even live through it.

I wish I could go back in time to 1983 and slap the crap out my younger self when he picked up that habit. It wasn't like it is today. Back then, it was the "in" and "cool" thing to do and at $1.00 a pack it was cheap too.

[ConcinusMan]

I think I mentioned it already that Big Bertha just shed a little over a month ago and then immediately locked up with a male. It had been about 6 months since her last shed, and this is a normal interval for her.

She's a snake that under normal circumstances, sheds about twice a year. In fact, that's exactly how many times she has shed since becoming gravid last year. Like clockwork, the shed comes every 5-6 months. That may seem like a long time but you have to consider that she is huge and nearly at max size for her kind (she's a concinnus female right around 113 cm / 3.7 feet / 44.4 inches) so growth is very slow at this point in her life.

Well, after shedding and then mating about a month ago, she started getting fat of course, but went right into shed again only a few weeks after her last shed and becoming gravid. She just finished her blue phase and is now in the clear.

Has anyone else noticed something like this when there females become gravid? I mean a shedding frequency that seems to be way to early?

It makes sense that since she is gravid and rapidly expanding that she would need to shed again in order for her skin to fit right. I just wondered if anyone else had observed the same thing in their snakes.

[guidofatherof5]

65 degrees tomorrow(Friday). Hoping to get some radix cam action on video.

[ConcinusMan]

Wow. Sounds awesome. If we had that here, I'd already be out herping and checking out the local dens. But noooooo! it has to be typical normal weather for this time of year. Pouring rain ( an inch to an inch and a half a day, I'm not kidding) 20-30 MPH wind, low 50's, mudslides, downed trees.... yuk. If it's anything like last year, this will continue through April except for the occasional day when we wake up and it's sunny and 75 degrees outside. By the time that happens I have to spend my day mowing foot tall grass.